Doug Williams

Well another turn went by and I can tell the MG teams in foxholes are firing their small arms, but none of them seem to actually be firing the MG itself. Perhaps it's just a limitation of the graphics, but the MG seems to be outside the foxhole, and the two soldiers who seem to be tasked with firing the MG just seem to crawl around and never fire the MG, while the other team members fire their rifles. I think I have three different MG34s setup in different foxholes, and I am noticing the same behavior with all of them. Like I said earlier, I have never bothered with foxholes before because I remember reading that they provide very little, if any, cover. This is a "computer pick forces" game, and the computer saw fit to give me a bunch of foxholes, so I thought I would try them out, in the hope that foxholes had been "beefed up" a bit post patch.

Title pretty much asks my question. I am in a quick battle (me defending against an assault). Computer picked forces for both sides. I have some MG teams setup in foxholes. They have been clicked to "deploy weapons", but they do not seem to be firing their machine guns against visible enemy targets. I have never played with foxholes in CMBN (or any CMX2 game). Was I wrong to put my MG teams in foxholes? Since, when I was in the U.S. Army, I fired a United States Machine Gun Caliber 7.62 mm M60, from inside a foxhole, I did not think that would be a problem.

I suppose it could have just been a graphics anomaly. The game engine may well have calculated that the shell struck the infantryman, but the graphics only showed it passing near him.

In the occurrence that I witnessed, the shell did not appear to strike the infantryman. It looked to me like it simply passed near him and he fell over dead. I watched it several times to be sure he was not killed by small arms fire, but I could not see any evidence that anything besides the tank round passing near him caused him to become a casualty. Unfortunately, I did not save the turn.

I have also seen this happen in the game. In a recent game I noticed an 88mm shell pass near an infantryman and he instantly became a casualty. I don't believe the shell ever impacted anything on the map, but continued off map, so he was not killed by the explosion. Sorry, I don't remember if it was an AP or an HE round, but I do remember thinking to myself, that it was an odd occurrence.

You can ask GaJ to invite you to his H2HHelper dropbox folder. The latest updates are always in there.

I didn't read any further in this post, or this thread, not because I was not interested, but because I am very busy and do not have the time. The AI can, and will, win. There are so many variables in CMBN that, like poker, even if you play a perfect game, you will lose occasionally. The AI cannot hold a candle, over time, to a real human opponent, assuming the human is of average or above average intelligence, and has taken the time to learn the basics of how to play the game. That is why I joined a gaming club (WeBoB, in my case). I prefer playing human opponents. They are much more unpredictable. Nuff said.

I would appreciate any info on the X-Com reboot. You can just point me in the general direction or PM me to avoid the forum police.

I have had the exact opposite experience. Most of the time the AI is blasting away with it's off board arty in a section of the map that I have no troops in.

Well, that explains some of the wonky scores that I sometimes see then. Thanks.

I very much.....VERY much prefer WEGO over RT. If CM were RT only, I probably would never have bought it. Perhaps it's just a sign of my age, who knows? I love being able to replay turns over and over and zoom in on different parts of the screen to see exactly what happened. The only type of scenario I would ever consider playing in RT would be a very small one, and even then I still prefer WEGO. As for CMx1. I own them all, and they were and still are, great games. They still contain certain features that I wish were in CMx2, such as moveable waypoints, etc. With that said, for the first time in years, I have deleted them from my hard drive. CMBN made me just not want to go back to CMx1 anymore. Still, if you wish to experience some East Front CM, then CMBB is pretty much all you are going to have for quite some time. I'm bad at predictions, but I don't imagine we will see an East Front CMx2 game for at least a year, probably longer.

So, am I understanding correctly that a single soldier inside a victory location can deny control of that location to an opponent?

What criteria does CMBN use to calculate who has control of a victory location at end of game? Does a VL have to be scrubbed completely clean of any enemy forces whatsoever? I just finished a small meeting engagement QB against the AI and, at the end of the game, I had at least two (mostly full) squads and an HQ unit in the VL, while the AI only had a couple of paniced troops in the VL. Throughout the entire game, it was quite obvious that my forces were winning. By the end of the game, ALL of the AI's few remaining troops had very poor morale, and all of it's AFVs were destroyed. My forces only took minor casualties, and all of my AFVs were in good order. Result: "Minor" Victory for me, and I was not awarded points for VL control. Huh? Now a game against the AI is unimportant, but if this had been a tournament game I would have been disappointed.

Since the "cheating" question has already been answered, I will just make the observation, CM1fan, that you will discover, if you have not already, that the AI is only a mediocre opponent, at best. It does best, IMO, in pre-made scenarios where the scenario designer gives it a script and specifies that the human play a certain side. In quick battles, the AI is decent at defending, if you give it +25% (or better) forces. It sucks at attacking, but occasionally gets lucky. PBEM is where CMBN really shines, IMO, but the AI has the huge advantage of always being available for a game, and a fantastic turn rate. ;-)

I use Vein's terrain desaturation V2, and am happy with it.

I will wear it with pride. :-)

I have been censored, and reprimanded for my flagrant violation of forum rules. Well, that is a bit dramatic. "Moon" informed me that no commercial (i.e. not BFC related if it involves the transfer of funds), links are allowed on these forums. I informed "Moon" that I have been a loyal customer of Big Time Software since the initial release of Combat Mission, Beyond Overlord, and that I have also been a vocal supporter of Big Time Software (now Battlefront.com) since their beginning, but that fell on deaf ears. And, you know what, I really don't blame Moon. He is the forum administrator, he has a job to do, and he is doing it...and he is doing it well. Please.....take a moment to do a Google search on Wasteland 2. Developers, including Battlefront, Blizzard, Bioware, and others, are being gobbled up by publishers who don't give a rat's ass about quality and creativity in our hobby, computer games.

Sorry, GaJ, the mere sight of me causes panic in most normal men. ;-) Actually, I am still a bit confused why that crew abandoned a perfectly functional StuG. Nothing is firing on it that could possibly cause it harm, yet the remaining crew have paniced and fled almost off the map.

Kickstarter seems like a good way for developers and players to get the games that they want, VS some soulless publisher dictating what they think we want. I donated $50 to the Wasteland 2 project, which means, when complete, I get the boxed game, paper manual, and cloth map. Did you notice the comments of the CEO's of Blizzard and Bioware? I wager they will be watching this in the hope that perhaps they can regain creative control of their companies.

I don't read every post on these forums, so I missed that. If a 3rd party developed the iPad version, and it hasn't detracted from the further developement of "real" CM, then I really don't have a problem with it. Sorry for "freaking out".

Put me down as whatever you want. I have been a staunch, vocal supporter of BFC since the demo of CMBO, way longer than most of the posters on this forum. I don't hide behind cute usernames or any other bull****. If you want to contact me you can e-mail kb4oer [at] gmail [dot] com. I've been playing wargames since cardboard Panzerblitz. If BFC wants to venture into the iPad apps business, then good for them. If they are doing it at the expense of developing serious Combat Mission further.....then they have lost me as a customer. I hope, very much hope, that is not the case. If so, good luck competing with Angry Birds.

Yes, I was wrong. This is not an April Fool's joke, though I wish it was. BFC is dumbing down it's product, and bowing to making $$ in lieu of making quality computer wargames. An iPad Combat Mission? Really? rune? You endorse this? Really? I expected better. Rock on, bro.

Sandahl Bergman, the subject of many-a-boy's fantasy since Conan the Barbararian. I still think she kicks ass right up there with Sigourney Weaver. Oh, and BFC....nice try.

This is very cool. The fans are funding the development of a game that *they* want. I'll donate, for sure. [commercial url removed]

I agree. "Fight to the last man" type situations should be rare on the Western Front.